Author Sisonke Msimang on Expresso (24 Oct 2017)

We were joined by author Sisonke Msimang for the first, in the Expresso studio. She joins us to discuss her much anticipated memoir ‘Always Another Country’ which covers the chapters in her life.

Her memoir focuses on her life such as childhood, when she had to live in exile in Kenya and Zambia, what it was like studying in Canada andNorth America, and then he return in the 90’s. Each place she was in has it’s own story, such as experiencing sexual violence in Zambia by a gardener, when she was seven, and while in Canada, she was called as “African monkey.” The memoir takes us through socio political landscape that South Africa is in, and she also explores her own identity. She has said that the memoir is not only about herself, but also South Africa as a whole, from the eyes of an ordinary citizen. It explores the socio-economical climate in the country at the current moment and it also touches on how we all are trying to secure a place for ourselves in the country.

“I wanted to embody was the sense that we are always searching for another country and we are always wanting this to be a different country to what it is, which is a better country," she has said.